Testing
 Testing is one of the most important things you will do in creating your website. Thoroughly testing your website insures that it will display the same (or very close to the same) in any browser. Testing can take a lot of time, especially if you wait until you have finished your entire website before you start testing. The best approach for most developers is to test your pages as you create them, to test your page compatibility (links between your pages) every time you add one to the site, and test your entire site once it is finished (this includes following every path through your site that a user could potentially follow). After each of these stages of testing the developer should fix errors that they spotted then retest, and follow this pattern until all of the kinks are worked out. There are also other issues than browser that can alter the appearance of your site/pages from one user to the next. Screen resolution is another serious concern, particularly those users with a very low resolution. A very low resolution can cause those users to have to scroll horizontally and vertically a lot more then other users. If your site has large images or text and the user viewing it has a low resolution, they are not likely to spend the time need to scroll side to side and up and down when they could just go to the next website returned by there chosen search engine. While not as prevalent as resolution and browser software, the operating system can also affect website appearance, thus your site should be tested on multiple operating systems as well if possible. |
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The developer really has two choices for testing there web pages, one is to use multiple computers each running different operating systems and browsers, the other is to use an online service to do the testing for you. While both can be costly the second is probably the cheaper of the two and it is definitely less time consuming. One of the best and most affordable online services for this is BrowserCam. BrowserCam owns a server farm with many computers running many different operating systems, screen resolutions and browsers. They provide a Screen Capture Service and a Remote Access Service. The Screen Capture Service allows you to enter your URL, a browser, an OS and a screen resolution and have a screen capture of your web page running with the configuration you selected. The Remote Access Service allows you to actually connect to one of their computers and test the page out yourself. For the time, effort and money you will save by using this service, it is definitely something to consider when it is time to test your site. |
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